


a question of trust

by antikytheras



Category: Saiyuki Gaiden
Genre: Developing Relationship, Insubordination, M/M, but we all know that's what tenpou likes about kenren
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-19
Updated: 2020-04-19
Packaged: 2021-03-02 00:34:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,594
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23736187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/antikytheras/pseuds/antikytheras
Summary: Kenren gets into a little more trouble than he should.
Relationships: Kenren Taishou/Tenpou Gensui
Kudos: 15





	a question of trust

**Author's Note:**

> full disclaimer: i found this fic in an old hard drive, last edited in march of 2018. i no longer remember where i intended to go with this so i wrapped it up and decided to post it as-is

Kenren's heard lots of interesting, juicy gossip about the Ants of Heaven, but even with all the (ridiculously overexaggerated) whispers of the Field Marshal's oddity and his own tendency toward sexual deviance, the last thing he expects is to end up sleeping with his direct superior barely two weeks after their first meeting.

But look, here's the thing (and that's exactly it, there's a thing and it terrifies-and-excites Kenren in equal measure): in the stuffy peace and sterility of Up Here, Tenpou is a candle that burns so bright he's bound to consume what little stale air they have, and Kenren's like a flighty, fickle gust of wind that can't help being drawn to him for it.

And, well, Kenren is a lot of things— he likes to think he does a good job of looking out for his men, and he likes to think that he's pulled his weight, that his transferral to the Western Army isn't entirely a massive burden on the field marshal's shoulders.

But when the rumours start to drip with innuendos so overt in their subtlety they might as well be screaming their disapproval in his face, Kenren thinks it's only fair-and-natural for him to set things straight.

Which is why he doesn't expect the clipped, almost angry contents of the letter that arrives at his desk the very next day.

'See me in my office immediately,' orders Tenpou in his messy scrawl, and unfortunately, going by the sharper angles littered all over the marshal's typically lazily-formed letters, it doesn't look like a booty call.

So Kenren saunters down to the marshal's room with his hands in his pockets and a strategy cooking in his head while he leisurely makes his way through the hallways. The marshal's clearly not pleased about something, and the question of why seems like it has a fairly obvious answer. Kenren could probably distract him with some (very) careful redirection and vaguery, but he has to admit that if Tenpou really put his mind to it, there's no way Kenren can even hope to avoid getting chewed out for his "impulsivity". Really, the marshal needs to stop projecting his own faults onto his poor overworked general—

All that careful planning goes right out the window when he spots the irate Dragon King of the Western Seas pacing in front of Tenpou's desk.

Kenren suddenly remembers to knock, three beats too late. 'Sir?'

Tenpou is sitting behind his desk, a casual act of insubordination that Goujun is generous to allow. His long, long fingers are laced together and cover the lower half of his face in a deliberately delicate image. Tenpou's poker face is already a nightmare to deal with, but his lavender eyes are sharp-and-contemplative, and even without reading the rest of his facial expression Kenren knows that he's absolutely fucked.

'General,' Tenpou acknowledges, and Kenren hates that his traitorous body still relaxes on response to that smooth, lilting voice, even in the face of an obvious trap.

One of Goujun's ears flicks irritably. His gaze flits between his marshal and his general, lingering on Kenren for just a second too long.

'When you first arrived,' Tenpou continues primly, and Kenren's eyes immediately flick over to meet his again, 'I believe I informed you of the differences in how we run things here, compared to the Eastern Army.'

Tenpou's never used this tone of voice on him before. Kenren finds that his throat's gone dry. 'Yes?'

'Yes sir,' Goujun snaps, a thunderstorm brewing in the bleak grey of his eyes.

Kenren's ready to parrot absolutely anything and everything Goujun says, even if it's some dumb shit like "pineapples don't belong on pizza", but the moment he opens his mouth Tenpou shoots him a look and motions for him to fall silent. Stunned, Kenren watches as Tenpou turns that same look on his direct superior, his brows knitted together in put-out consternation when he mildly remarks, 'You said that you'd leave the matter of my general's discipline to me, no?'

It's an open, unmasked challenge. Kenren doesn't need to set his eyes on Goujun to know that his hackles are raised.

'Your subordinates are my subordinates,' he hisses, rounding on Tenpou in a flurry of silks and (practical) opulent finery adorning his body like shining armour against the forked tongues of Heaven. 'His mistakes are my mistakes. Your job is—'

Tenpou cuts in curtly, but somehow manages to come across as unquestionably polite when he questions, 'Didn't we agree that my platoon remains mine to manage, and mine alone?'

Through his shock, where he stands rooted to the floor bearing helpless witness to Field Marshal Tenpou's disrespect and blatant insubordination, Kenren notes the interesting shade of purple blooming on Goujun's pale skin. He tries to be subtle when he sneaks a peek at Tenpou, only to find that Tenpou's already watching him with a thoughtful gaze, and that's when Kenren understands that there's something much bigger going on beneath the surface of this ridiculous charade of a disciplinary hearing.

Well. This time, he intends to avoid getting kicked out of his platoon, so he'll just have to do a little grave-digging when he's free.

The dragon exhales, a white puff of burning steam escaping his lips like cigarette smoke (and now Kenren has to wonder about all those times he's found Tenpou relaxing in his chair like he's nothing but a sack of bones holding a stick of pure lung cancer, breathing out white clouds while wearing the expression of a curious child playing with his food) and the anger-and-colour drain from his face once more. 'Regardless of whatever arrangement we may have, in the eyes of my people, I answer to the transgressions of your platoon.'

'So you do,' Tenpou agrees easily, and that's a huge red flag if Kenren's ever seen one. 'But tell me, when have I ever let you down?'

Goujun remains silent, and with the tiniest triumphant gleam of satisfaction in his near-unreadable eyes, Tenpou leans back in his chair and primly folds his hands onto the desk. That's the moment Kenren realises exactly what kind of man he's been sleeping with.

If the realisation sparks a little thrill that runs through him, well—

'Control your pet,' is Goujun's final bored (tired) admonishment, and then he's gone in a swirl of red-flecked white.

Kenren awkwardly shuffles out of the way, but Goujun doesn't even bother to acknowledge him with any sort of look. After a few terse seconds that follow once the Dragon King of the Western Seas exits the room, Tenpou reaches for a book on his desk and begins to flip through it idly on his lap.

The marshal's office is well-ventilated despite the clutter (and Kenren has to bite back a long-suffering groan, because he swears that he'd just tidied up the place a day ago but somehow it's already back to looking like the aftermath of a missile strike in World War Five Hundred-and-something) but Kenren finds that he's beginning to sweat. Just a little.

Kenren tries for obedient-but-impish when he says, 'Permission to leave, sir?'

Tenpou flips to the next page and doesn't look up from his book. 'Permission denied.'

Well fuck.

'Are you mad about something?' Kenren demands.

'Very,' Tenpou agrees, finally looking up from his apparently very-absorbing light novel. Which means that Kenren must be on the right track.

With a sigh, Kenren surrenders and walks straight into a checkmate. There's no point playing mind games with someone he actually has a Thing with. Besides, Tenpou could probably outsmart him any day. 'Is it 'cos I beat up that guy?'

'No.' Tenpou frowns, then corrects, 'Well, not exactly.'

Ah. Bingo. His hands in his pockets, Kenren saunters right up to the petulant Field Marshal and plonks his ass right on his (unusually neat) desk. While he's twisting round to get a better view of his superior, Tenpou has idly set his book aside and is leaning forward with his elbows planted on the table and his hands clasped under his chin. There's a look of quiet-burning anticipation in his eyes, and Kenren is all-too-obliging in carrying out his marshal's silent order.

There's no resistance when Kenren leans in and presses a kiss to Tenpou's lips. In fact, judging by the fist clenched tight in his collar, he's pretty sure Tenpou is feeling inclined toward anything but. The marshal's fingers are warm when they brush against his bare chest, burning little heated trails just-under his skin, and before Kenren can so much as groan at the sensation those nimble fingers grab at the front of his collar and _yank_.

The sudden action almost sends him falling into Tenpou's lap, but thankfully he somehow manages to keep semi-upright. There's barely even time to think about how to best contort his muscles into a somewhat comfortable position before Tenpou's unbearably warm mouth is sliding up the side of his neck, biting bruises right over his racing pulse, teeth scraping against his (coincidentally exposed) collarbones, and sheer pleasure shoots up-and-down Kenren's spine and escapes his mouth in a broken gasp and a wet, obscene moan. Everything feels warm (so, so warm) and he wants nothing more than to tear his clothes off (case ambiguity be damned, as long as one of them's getting naked he doesn't really care about the little details like who) but with the way he's splayed across the table under the marshal's relentless assault there's absolutely no way he can so much as move an inch. He almost doesn't notice the other hand carding through his hair, so deceptively gentle-and-sweet until Tenpou finds the exact spot he wants and tightens his grip in a deliberate, precisely calculated upward increase in pressure-and-sensation and _holy shit_ , when was he ever into that?

Then, almost as abruptly as it had started, the sensory overload comes to a complete stop, and if Kenren were a lesser man he'd have whined at the loss. Instead, he opens his eyes (and just when had they ever been closed?) to find Tenpou looking over his handiwork with a faintly pleased, lazy smile and the same critical eye Kenren has seen observing the platoon during their more avant-garde training drills.

'Good,' is the almost-hoarse murmur of approval he gets (and even that sends a jolt straight to Kenren's groin, because hot fucking damn he's never even imagined what Tenpou might sound like when he loses his composure and now he's suffering from an over-abundance of material to remember him by) before Tenpou leans in again, those hands sliding over his jaw and cupping his face in a tender gesture. But the bastard stops just short of any further contact, his breath ghosting over Kenren's mouth, and with the way Tenpou's staring a little dazedly at him Kenren knows it's painted bright-red with loving abuse, so he tries to show that even in his current state he's more-than-okay with meeting him halfway by eagerly crushing their lips together in yet another searing kiss.

The question of Tenpou's approval seems entirely irrelevant now that they're indulging in a filthy display of sloppy tongues-and-teeth, and then Tenpou tilts his general's head to just the right angle at which he likes to really savour his kisses, nice and soft and sweet, and Kenren can't help the almost-fond smile that creeps onto his traitorous face. If he feels those eager-pliant lips, always so cooperative in moving against-and-along-with his, curve up into a smile too, well— He's certainly not going to complain.

When he draws back, Tenpou lets out a little huff of disappointment tempered by the irritation searing beneath his skin. But then Kenren leans back in and rests his forehead on his superior's, and he's pleased to find a welcome sweetness in the tiny space between them where their heated breaths meet halfway and mingle.

'I'll be more careful,' he promises at last.

Tenpou hums, eyes half-lidded in complacent triumph now that his anger-and-worry have been appeased. 'You do that.'

Some time later, shortly after the incident in the office, Kenren runs into the Dragon King of the Western Seas again.

Goujun's barely even looks at him, his expression as stormy as ever when he shoulders past Kenren. Kenren doesn't think he's even trying to be intimidating— when your clothes take up that much space, there's only so much squeezing you can do in the (somewhat) narrow hallways of heaven, and the Dragon King of the Western Seas certainly isn't about to press himself to the wall for anyone.

But the almighty Dragon King of the Western Seas does pause and offer his newly-minted, lowly general a second glance.

'Don't trust that man,' is his only sparse, cryptic warning before he sweeps past Kenren, robes fluttering like fragile butterfly wing-beats in the hurricane of the-future-he-sees.

The next time Kenren gets into a fight, it's because someone gets a little too leery in extolling the virtues of the Field Marshal's face. He's not entirely sure what comes over him— a flash of irritation, a loud thunderclap, a strange wind roaring in his ears, and then suddenly a senior official is curled up on the floor, whimpering while he clutches at his bloody, broken nose.

And again, just one day after that (and mind you, one day is ridiculously— almost brutally— swift in something as senselessly hierarchal as the army), he finds himself summoned to Tenpou's office.

This time, he remembers to knock.

'Sir? General Kenren, reporting in.'

'Goujun's not here,' is the absentminded, muffled reply from the other side of the door.

Kenren tentatively tests the door, and to see it swing open without so much as a hint of resistance (or worse, a tower of books toppling) has become something of a massive relief these days.

These days. Kenren shakes his head, enters the room, and promptly (and conveniently) forgets to hold his thought.

Tenpou's crouched in front of one of his shelves, idly rifling through a pile of books on the floor. Going by the trail of destruction left from floor-to-ceiling, it's pretty safe to assume that Tenpou's desired book is still nowhere to be found.

'Close the door,' he requests without so much as looking over his shoulder. Somehow, Tenpou always knows exactly when Kenren's got both feet in through the door. Then again, this is the man who's somehow keeping tabs on the comings-and-goings of everyone and everything within his personal army, and Kenren wouldn't be surprised to learn that he'd cast his net much further out a long time ago.

With a sigh, Kenren shuts the door and, steeling himself for the inevitable, locks it for good measure.

'Are you angry—'

Tenpou pushes a stack of books aside and still doesn't glance backwards. 'Have you seen my copy of _The Art of War_?'

Kenren stares. 'What?'

'My book,' Tenpou continues, not-quite-patiently. 'The one you gifted me, from the surface world. I need it to finish a report for Hua Tuo and I can't find it anywhere.'

Kenren didn't think it was possible to stare any harder, but he's definitely staring now. 'Hua Tuo? You don't mean the Hua Tuo? Imperial Physician Hua Tuo? Ascended-to-godhood-for-his-contributions-to-mankind Hua Tuo?'

'Yes,' Tenpou says mildly, with no small amount of concern for the seemingly-defunct inner workings of Kenren's mind. 'That Hua Tuo. Though I hear he prefers to be referred to as Yuanhua.'

Kenren's head is starting to spin a little. 'How did you even get— He's always fully booked, I— Does he even know that you— I thought only the royal families—'

And now Tenpou turns back, but only to eye the mark on Kenren's forehead thoughtfully. 'Hm.'

Kenren rubs his temples (casually concealing the mark of royalty, if only because he swears it's started to burn under Tenpou's idle scrutiny) and hopes that the building headache isn't a sign of what's to come. 'You know what, I won't ask.'

'Wise choice.' Tenpou smiles when he agrees, but Kenren's not foolish enough to let his guard down or offer the Field Marshal any quarter.

Instead, he wonders aloud, 'How do you even find anything in this mess?'

And now Tenpou finally, really, looks at him.

'Hm. Well. When I put something down, I usually know where it is. In other words, there is rhyme to my madness. But when other people start moving things around without telling me, that's when I need to call them in to help me look for my books.'

Kenren reads between the lines easily, thanks to the subtext so kindly and blatantly offered to him that it might as well have been marked urgent and underlined in red ink.

So it's with a grin that he strolls forward and picks a thin volume out from its place in the tower that Tenpou had just pushed aside, where it's sandwiched between two massive compilations of great literary works, each about three thousand pages long. Kenren's not sure if he's ever seen Tenpou even attempt to haul those monstrosities from the floor to his table, and this is the guy who found _War and Peace_ "only slightly less dry than one of those crackers issued in the standard MREs".

He drops _The Art of War_ into his marshal's waiting lap and offers a shrug to go with it. 'Sometimes ya just overlook some stuff. Happens to the best of us.'

Tenpou's eyes are wide in surprise, but he also looks like he can't quite help the smile that's creeping onto his face.

Kenren grins wider. He knows his marshal will get used to him and all his idiosyncrasies. Eventually. And then those wide-eyed looks of wonder will start to get rarer and rarer, but that just means that Kenren will learn to really savour every little huff of pleased surprise he can coax out of his lover, even if Tenpou’s always three hop-skips ahead.

Caught up in a strangely domestic warmth, it's like someone dumps a bucket of ice down his back when Tenpou too-casually asks, 'So why did you feel the dire need to beat up that poor senior official?'

Kenren's smile freezes.

'He's been very vocal about having you dismissed from your post,' Tenpou continues, flipping through his recovered book until he finds the exact page he wants. 'But he's been unusually tight-lipped about how he managed to piss off our lovably affable General of the Western Army.'

'Has he?'

'Very much so. Would you care to explain yourself?'

Kenren isn't too sure, but he's pretty willing to bet that he's fucked, and not in the good way. 'Uh. Well. See, I was giving that mission report to the higher-ups, cos you didn't want to— weren't available for the meeting,' he hastily corrects, and Tenpou gives that little stifled snort that means he's trying not to laugh, and Kenren starts to think that okay, maybe he's not that fucked after all.

But it's with perfectly unruffled composure that Tenpou replies, 'Yes, I remember.'

'Yeah, so I was trying to explain that the baseball training was definitely helping the troops' efficiency and morale, and one of the officials sounded interested in hearing more about our training regimen so he pulled me aside after the meeting.'

'Wait,' Tenpou interjects mildly. 'I don't see how—'

'Ah, ah, we're getting there. So he listens to my explanation of how baseball games work on the surface world— damn bastard needed three different explanations to figure out what a home run was— and then at the end he gets all weird and pervy about, uh. Yeah. Some weird stuff.'

Usually Tenpou enjoys watching him squirm, but this time he looks far more interested in prying the truth out of him. 'Yes?'

Kenren takes a deep breath. 'He, uh. Started telling me all about how fortunate I was to be working under a brilliant man like yourself. Also he really likes your face, apparently. Wants to do all sorts of shit to— Are you _laughing_?'

Tenpou's lip twitches back into a neutral position. Or, at least, it certainly makes a valiant effort. 'Oh my.'

'How's that an appropriate reaction?' Kenren demands.

Tenpou snorts, then averts his eyes and laughs to himself. Just a little.

When he's done, he takes one look at Kenren's positively befuddled expression and relents. 'He's not the first of his kind, and he certainly won't be the last. Surely you don't think this pretty face isn't used to this kind of treatment by now?'

Kenren shrugs helplessly. 'Yeah, I guess, but _I’m_ not. It’s still annoying for me to hear. Besides, he was starting to look as if he’d caught on to whatever you’re hiding under that bunny-ears lawyer façade, so I thought a nice smack might effectively get all that out of his system.’ As an afterthought, he grins, sly and conspiratorial, and adds, ‘Can’t have anyone getting wind of your plans too early, right?’

Tenpou’s lavender eyes are wide-and-startled again, and although he’s still staring down at the book in his lap Kenren’s pretty sure that even if the words started floating off the page, there’s nothing in _The Art of War that_ could surprise him, especially since he’s pretty much gotten it memorised.

‘No,’ he says at last, looking up at Kenren with the curtain drawn back from his eyes and the full warmth of the destructive, impetuous fire blazing bright within him. ‘I suppose not.’

Even after all that follows, neither of them ever quite feels the need to speak of the word “trust”.

Not when it has already been given.

Not when it has always been a given.

**Author's Note:**

> [twitter](https://twitter.com/syorobao)


End file.
